


Only a Memory

by Input_Error



Category: Six of Crows Series - Leigh Bardugo
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canonical Child Abuse, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Nightmares, Past Child Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-13
Updated: 2018-05-13
Packaged: 2019-05-06 01:33:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,729
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14631297
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Input_Error/pseuds/Input_Error
Summary: I will not bend until I breakHow much can one bruised body take?Just not enough to silence meYou’re only a memoryI’ll scream these words ‘til they come trueThen I will think no more of youLook back on what I’m going throughThis isn’t my identity-Only a Memory by Icon for Hire





	Only a Memory

When Wylan awakes, he feels like his entire body is bruised. Which, to be fair, is likely not far from the truth. The memory of the previous day stays vivid in his mind, replaying over and over like a broken record.

He remembers the shouts of _'not good enough'_ , the cries of _'embarrassment'_ , and the howls of _'ashamed'_. He can easily recall the burn of his father's fist cracking against the side of his face, then his right rib cage, his temple, his jaw, his collar bone, his biceps, triceps, his chest. But most of all he remembers the painful twist in his stomach and the persistent voice in his head-his own voice- reminding him that this was not how a father was supposed to treat his son. But Wylan of course already knew that. His constant battle to make his father proud of him was not one fought due to any lack of understanding or trying. It was fought due to Wylan's own inability to do what his father and everyone else in Ketterdam knew to be a simple task.

As a young child, Wylan could recall his own confusion of being asked to read and write. For the longest time, he thought it was a game that grown ups and older children liked to play. To him it was like staring at a far off object and guessing what it was. But the older Wylan got, the more adamant his father was to force him to make sense of the blur.

The word _'dyslexia'_ rings in Wylan's head out of nowhere, and he abruptly removes his gaze from the familiar ceiling of his room and scans the room for any disturbance. He can't recall ever hearing that term, or even what it means. Just that it's apparently ingrained in his head now and he can't stop thinking about how it got there.

He's saved from his momentary lapse of sanity by a quick rap of knuckles on the wooden door to his room. "Mr. Van Eck, your father would like to have a word with you in his study."

The voice is masculine, and undoubtedly one of the newer day servants his father hired to do everything for him. When he doesn't respond immediately, the voice calls again. "He seems to find the matter urgent, so I'd hurry if I were you."

After a moment, the man hears Wylan's scuffling about the wooden panels of his room, and seems to take that as his answer. Wylan's brain can't help but go back to the servant's words, specifically the lilt at the end of the servant's voice which he recognized to be somewhat akin to sympathy. He was likely one of the servants to escort Wylan back to his room after last night's beatings. Most of the workers of the house knew that Wylan was constantly doing something to warrant the abuse he regularly received from his father, but none of them knew the truth about what spurred Jan Van Eck's cruelty.

None of them would be sympathetic if they knew the truth.

Wylan understood better than anyone else that the disappointment and abuse from his father was well-founded. Everybody else on the face of the Earth could read or write so long as they'd been taught. Wylan's father had been quick to remind him countless times that he'd been given access to the brightest tutors money could buy, so why couldn't he read? Why couldn't he make sense of the letters? Was he truly so fucked up and such a mess that he had the ability to and he just wouldn't?

The voice in his head chimes in again- _It's not your fault_. This time, it is a slightly different voice. It isn't his own. It's a masculine voice, more rich and smooth than Wylan's. It is too full of warmth to be his father's, and too confident to be any of the servants that had tried to speak to him in the past. So who's voice could it be? And what did the words even mean? Of course it is Wylan's fault. Wylan's the screw up. He's the mess. He has to take the blame. He has to take the blame because everyone else who's not messed up says so. And what logic does Wylan have to argue with people who aren't embarrassments to their own family?

Wylan already knows what the talk is going to be about with his father, even as he replaces his cotton night clothes with trousers and a sweater. He knows that his father and Alys have been trying to conceive. He knows that he is unworthy to be his father's son and that he is lucky to live under the roof of their house while they still don't have a replacement. But it still stings to know that his father apparently has the courage to kick him out the morning following a particularly brutal beating.

As Wylan enters the study, he immediately wants to choke on the oppressive air. As he closes the door behind him, it feels less like he's entering to have a chat with his father and more like he's closed the door to his own tomb.

"Wylan. Dear." The words coming out of his father today are sweeter than usual, although they hold his sneering truth behind each word. Wylan knows, as he always does with his father, that the insults, the reprimanding, the abuse, is always a mistake away. Right now his father is feeling jovial. In the next few minutes he may not. "Wylan, I have asked you of your time to give you the most delightful news." The upturn of his father's features clues Wylan in that the news will not be delightful for him. Even though he's expecting the news- been expecting it for months, now- the weight of it hits him like a freight train.

"Alys is finally with child. Which means, you'll be having a baby brother or sister. Isn't that exciting?" His father's tone makes it sound like he's talking to a child instead of a 16 year old. If his father is looking for an answer, Wylan refuses to give him one. He's plastered to the chair across from his father with fear, disbelief, and something else that only started curling in his chest since the voices started bothering him. Anger. "What I'm trying to get at, my dear boy, is that our family has no use for you anymore. We'll be giving you a month to pack your things and move to the attic. It's cold there and not much room, but if you'd have been a better son, you would have gotten a better room, yeah?"

The voice in his head- definitely his own this time- screams and Wylan can feel the pressure building up inside of him until he can't stand it. "It's not my fault." It comes out more as a reassurance to himself than as a statement. Then, again, "It's _not_ my fault." This time it's more of a factual statement; a realization. The pressure inside of him begins to build up again. The voices inside of himself are shrieking now, and it's too difficult to ignore. He doesn't mean to speak up. He knows the pain that comes with standing up for himself. But he doesn't seem to have any control over his own actions.

"I've been told for 16 years that I'm wrong, that all of this is my mess to clean up, but it's not. I have _dyslexia_ , father. You haven't heard of it before, but Jesper says that it's a rare disorder that makes it extremely difficult to read." He takes a hesitant gulp of air, but the words continue to pour out.

"I tried everything I could do to make you proud of me. I studied languages, I learned music, I excelled in arithmetic. But it was never enough for you. And that's _your_ fault." Wylan still has no clue where the words come from. He doesn't know a Jesper, he still is positive he's never been told of dyslexia, and he knows for a fact that the confidence in his words comes from somewhere else.

Wylan knows the slap is coming before it even hits his cheek, but once he closes his eyes, the slap that he knows is bound to inevitably hit him turns into a light tapping of a warm palm against his cheek.

"Wy, Wy. Wake up. You're having a nightmare again." The voice is soothing and warm, the second voice in his head. _Jesper._ He instinctively curls into Jesper's chest in the bed beside him, balling the fabric of Jesper's night shirt in his fists and sobbing openly into it. Jesper rubs a soothing hand along Wylan's back and threads his other hand into Wylan's tousled knot of curls. "It was just a dream, Wy," Jesper reminds him. "I'm here. I've got you and I won't let anyone hurt you." At some point, Wylan's sobs grow quiet as he falls into a dreamless sleep.

In the morning, Wylan finds himself staring at the same ceiling as his nightmare. But the atmosphere is different. Wylan's in his house, in his childhood room. The monster that hid in the study down the hall is long dead, and Wylan has much better things to worry about. A body is entangled with Wylan's, the familiar slight build of muscle and warmth radiating from Jesper's deep brown skin. Wylan looks over at Jesper and can't help but smile. He looks so relaxed, and Wylan likes to enjoy the moments like these when he sees the boy he loves in his childhood room, in his childhood house that is just now beginning to feel like a home.

Wylan cringes at the memory of the dream and sighs. Jesper makes a groan beside him and Wylan knows that Jesper will be smothering him in early morning love and affection to make sure he's alright in less than a minute. But in the time between the loneliness of the early morning and the company of Jesper, Wylan feels satisfied in a way. His father is only a memory. A bad one, but a memory. And Wylan is reminded the minute Jesper's strong arms wrap around him that memories are easy to make and remember.

_But they're also easy enough to forget._


End file.
